Talk:Nunavut
This article has the same problems as the Yucatan one: Hudsonia just appears on a map in the novel, none of the characters go there, and as far as I can recall, they don't even discuss the province in the course of the novel. Moreover, while much of the legislation that created Nunavut in OTL was done in 1993-1994 (and if I'm wrong I am willing to be corrected) the actual territory wasn't established until 1999. The novel was published in 1995. Arguably, while Hudsonia may have been inspired by the history leading up to the creation of Nunavut, there's no way the authors meant for Hudsonia to be an actual analog of a territory that didn't legally exist. TR (talk) 20:31, January 20, 2015 (UTC) Take a look at the map of North America in the frontispiece of The Two Georges. As I mentioned before, the boundary between Hudsonia and Baffin is different than that between NWT and Nunavut. As TR says, the book came out well before the creation of Nunavut and it is not mentioned in the book itself, neither by the characters nor in the narration. ML4E (talk) 22:16, January 20, 2015 (UTC) ML4E, if you don't mind going off-topic, I'd be very grateful if you could clear something up for me: What exactly is the legal status of territories in your country, and how does it compare with that of provinces? I know Canada is committed to a form of federalism, but if I'm not mistaken it doesn't bear much resemblance to the American variety. Turtle Fan (talk) 04:14, January 21, 2015 (UTC) :I haven't thought about this much but my understanding is that Territories are purely Federal responsibility while Provinces have certain rights and powers set out within the constitution which the Federal Government can't interfere in without their agreement. The big one is health care which is a Provincial responsibility although there is a Federal Health Care Act which was negotiated with the Provinces to equalize care and let one Provincial plan be used in another Province by a resident who happens to be traveling or temporarily residing in the second Province. Agreement was accomplished by the Federal Government pledging funding and equalization payments in exchange for national standards. Another one is that any resource extraction is controlled by the particular Province and so royalties or fees they collect remain within that Province. :With Territories, the Federal Government collects any royalties but has all the expenses including health care. By Federal statute, they have set up territorial legislatures with a parliamentary executive (don't recall what they are called but aren't called Premiers as they are in the Provinces). However, the Federal Government can override any decisions although I don't recall that happening. :Another area of Provincial responsibility is over municipalities. Each Province has its own legislation although all are similar. This provision was included back in 1867 when the country was mostly rural so its significants has grown. In the Territories, this would be Federal. :Provinces have the right to their own Sales and Income Taxes although over the years, this has been piggy-backed on the Federal systems to minimize administrative overhead. This would be purely Federal in the Territories. Conversely, the Criminal Code is Federal but enforcement through policing and the courts is Provincial. However, aside from Ontario and Quebec (and possibly Newfoundland), Provincial policing is contracted with the RCMP although big cities still have their own municipal police. Again, in the Territories this would be directly through the RCMP and Federally appointed courts. :I don't know if this covers what you want to know but if you have any questions, ask away. ML4E (talk) 21:10, January 21, 2015 (UTC) ::That's very helpful, thanks. The only other thing I would ask is, are there ways for territories eventually to achieve provincial status? Turtle Fan (talk) 04:33, January 22, 2015 (UTC) :I believe there is but off hand I don't know the procedures. The last province to join was Newfoundland in 1949 and they were a separate British colony rather than a Canadian Territory. Doing a quick google, the previous chunks of territory to become provinces were Saskatchewan and Alberta in 1905 from southern parts of the Northwest Territory. Its unlikely any of the other three will become Provinces any time soon given their low population (30-40 thousand each). ::Interesting, thanks. I hadn't realized Newfoundland had held out as a separate colony for so long. And yeah, I figured that if there was a procedure for territories to become provinces, there would be a minimum threshold of population required that the current territories don't come close to meeting. (The same is true of four of the five existing US territories vis a vis applications for statehood. If Puerto Rico wanted statehood, its population would not pose a problem. Actually I don't think much of anything would pose a problem, except that the residents don't seem to have too much interest. Even ten years ago, when the nominally pro-statehood party controlled the governor's office gets to appoint their governor but these days they pretty much just confirm whoever wins the election and had a huge majority in the elected legislature, they couldn't kick up any momentum for it.) Turtle Fan (talk) 00:26, January 23, 2015 (UTC) :One other point I had forgotten about is that aside from the Territorial Legislatures, each of the Territories elect members of the Federal Parliament the same as the Provinces. I believe that is different from the U.S. in that territories there didn't elect members of congress until they became states. Its not much of a political power since their low populations means that each Territory has only one MP out of a total of 308. ::The citizens of each territory get to elect one non-voting observer to the House. The observers are seated on the House floor, caucus with the parties to which they belong, I believe (not certain) that they can take part in floor debates, and they're even eligible for a few leadership posts. What they're not allowed to do is vote on legislation or procedural matters; I take it that's not the case for territorial MPs? Turtle Fan (talk) 00:26, January 23, 2015 (UTC) :::That's correct. They have the same rights, privileges and obligations as any other MP and candidates are usually members of the main parties and so sit in caucus of their respective party(s) if elected. ML4E (talk) 21:29, January 23, 2015 (UTC) ::::Interesting. But then, Canadian MPs represent the people directly. US Congressmen and -women do too, but the Constitutional foundations of Congress's makeup are very heavily tied to their being state delegates. That's even more so in the Senate, but it works that way in the House too. I recall at one point there was a call to give the District of Columbia full representation in the House (I don't believe they even have a non-voting observer) but every constitutional scholar who was asked to get involved in the campaign was of the opinion that it couldn't be done. Turtle Fan (talk) 02:27, January 24, 2015 (UTC) :Related to the above and the relevance of articles on NWT and Nunavut, take a look at these series of maps: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Northwest_Territories#1850.E2.80.931870. It makes me think that for Southern Victory, the invasion of Montana during the Second Mexican War would be from the larger Northwest Territory rather than Alberta (or possibly Saskatchewan) given the route of the invading army. This might justify an article on the bigger, older territory with an indication how it was split into the various Canadian Provinces and Territories. ML4E (talk) 20:07, January 22, 2015 (UTC) ::Hmm, now that I look at it, you're probably right. (Unless of course the circumstances of confederation were changed by the very different outcome of the ACW/WoS, which is likely.) We should consider it either way. Turtle Fan (talk) 00:26, January 23, 2015 (UTC) :::Changes in the timeline occurred to me too. Given the vast landscape and low population at the time, I don't think very many changes would have occurred before the Second Mexican War. As I had mentioned in one discussion board or other, I think the lancers Gordon had in his invasion were some variation on the Northwest Mounted Police, the precursors to the RCMP. Its reflected in their so called "Musical Ride" in the present day which is based on cavalry maneuvers by lancers from the 19th century. ML4E (talk) 21:29, January 23, 2015 (UTC) ::::There's a book I read last year on the ways in which Canada affected and was affected by the ACW. Its final and longest chapter dealt with confederation. It quoted extensively from the floor debate in Parliament (the Parliament of the Province of Canada, that is, which preceded the current federal government). Granted the author would have cherry-picked quotes that were most germane to his thesis, but even so, there seemed to be a lot of quotes by the Fathers of Confederation arguing that the US's emergence as a great military power made confederation something of a defensive necessity. It wasn't the only argument in their arsenal, of course, but it was one of the most persuasive on a gut level. ::::They put the same argument to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. One of those two (I'm afraid I can't recall which) was initially uninterested in confederation and was won over with reluctance. When I read that I found myself thinking that, in TL-191, without the security threat, there'd be a good chance that confederation would be rejected by that province. One rejection would not necessarily be fatal to the project, of course, but it would rather weaken the precedent that gradually convinced more and more small local authorities in BNA to join the new country. ::::As for the lancers being proto-Mounties, that's an interesting thought. I've done a little poking around the Internet every now and then since reading HFR all those years ago, and as far as I can tell, the regular British Army no longer sent lancers into combat at that time. (Greatly complicating my search is the fact that cavalry regiments that began as lancers continued to be known as the Nth Lancers after they changed over to other weapons; in fact, some armored regiments are still known as lancers to this day.) There were still some literal lancers in the Indian Army, but it would be the height of stupidity to bring men and horses all the way from India for such a small campaign, especially when there were local forces to draw on already. Turtle Fan (talk) 02:27, January 24, 2015 (UTC)